Hardware, Computer machinery and equipment, including memory, cabling, power supply, peripheral devices, and circuit boards. Computer operation requires both hardware and software. Hardware design specifies a computer’s capability; software instructs the computer on what to do. The advent of microprocessors in the late 1970s led to much smaller hardware assemblies and accelerated the proliferation of computers. Today’s personal computers are as powerful as the early mainframes, while mainframes are now smaller and have vastly more computing power than the early models.

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instructions that tell a computer what to do. Software comprises the entire set of programs, procedures, and routines associated with the operation of a computer system. The term was coined to differentiate these instructions from hardware — i.e., the physical components of a computer...

any of a type of miniature electronic device that contains the arithmetic, logic, and control circuitry necessary to perform the functions of a digital computer’s central processing unit. In effect, this kind of integrated circuit can interpret and execute program instructions as well as...

a digital computer designed for use by only one person at a time. A typical personal computer assemblage consists of a central processing unit (CPU), which contains the computer’s arithmetic, logic, and control circuitry on an integrated circuit; two types of computer memory, main memory,...